Andre Jaran

The modern orchestral conductor emerged with the rise of large scale symphony orchestras in the 19th century. In orchestral and choral music, a musician – a concertmaster – was able to use his body or bow to maintain rhythm and indicate the kind of sound to be played. The typically bombastic and verbose Richard Wagner…

*An edited version of this was published in The Jakarta Post. Before I got back on the train to Yogyakarta, my friend, Ramdhon said, “take your t-shirt off – it is better not to wear it in Yogyakarta, or even on the train.” Yogyakarta and Solo are seemingly locked in ongoing tensions: two nearby cities…